362 UNIVERSAL ERUDITION.' 



V. The laft method of exprefling our 

 thoughts, the ientiments and paflions of the 

 mind by means of the fight, is in the dance ; 

 fee vol. ii. page 419. Almoll from the firft ac- 

 counts we have of mankind by hiflory, we are 

 told of their dancing : we muft not imagine, 

 however, that the dances of the firft inhabitants 

 of the world, or all thofe of ancient nations, 

 were like fuch as are practifed in our days : 

 for we cannot fuppofe that when the king and 

 prophet David danced before the ark, he did 

 it in the ftep of a minuet or country- dance, as 

 that would prefent a very ftrange idea, and not 

 very compatible with our notions of the pro- 

 priety of manners. We fliould not have a very 

 high opinion of a king of France or Spain, 

 -for example, who mould dance before the hoft 

 in a religious proceflion, and in the face of all 

 the people. The dance was, among the an- 

 cients, fometimes a religious ceremony , and it 

 is faid in Ecclefiaftes, that there is a time to 

 dance. We have already remarked, in the chap- 

 ter on declamation, that the Greeks ufed the 

 word orckefiS) and the Latins that of faltatio^ in 

 a much more extenfive fenle than we do that of 

 dancing , and that the theatric declamation, ac- 

 companied by artificial geftures, and a determi- 

 nate expreffion, was there included ; as well as 

 the art of mimics and pantomimes, &c. The 

 tranflators meeting with the word orche/is^ o^uo-*?, 

 and the verb WK,>> from whence alfo is derived 

 the term orcheftra, and Jaltatio> faltare, or 



other 



